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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Apr 21, 2016 - 08:59pm PT
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Shetville, North of Los Angeles!
I just read that below your avatar.
What a total bust up!
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bvb
Social climber
flagstaff arizona
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Apr 21, 2016 - 09:32pm PT
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Roy, caught in calm repose between the non-stop episodes of antics and epics:
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StahlBro
Trad climber
San Diego, CA
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Apr 21, 2016 - 09:42pm PT
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dee ee
Mountain climber
Of THIS World (Planet Earth)
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Apr 21, 2016 - 11:04pm PT
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Nice.
Damn, this thread has legs!
Guargoyal Luncheon Meat WTF? It's time for topos.
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overwatch
climber
Arizona
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Apr 22, 2016 - 08:39am PT
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I do remember getting rained out
Rain was common back then, we would hike around all day and have just as much fun
It was for sure a snow storm because it was significant in my mind due to the fact that I had never heard of snow in the desert before being as noob as they come on things desert. I was a forest and beach kid up to that point. Regardless it is interesting to ponder how things would have been different for me if we had actually climbed something and I had got into it the way I did when I really took up climbing at the ripe age of 35. I was maybe 18-20 years old at most when you and I went.
Those old pics above are so cool.
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Fuzzywuzzy
climber
suspendedhappynation
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Apr 22, 2016 - 09:37am PT
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Go Royo GO!!!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Apr 22, 2016 - 03:47pm PT
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Those topos could be considered more risqué than full frontal nudity!
... And could get this thread struck from the ethers.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Apr 22, 2016 - 03:48pm PT
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Okay, another picture of Al Roberts.
I think this is my favorite portrait of Al, booting up for our first climb in Canyonlands, early May of 1983.
It might be my favorite climber portrait EVER:
(BIG thanks to Peter Haan for meticulously cleaning up that portrait. Love you, Peter!)
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So, Alan Roberts may not have been a hot 5.11 leader, but I guarantee you NOBODY could have loved climbing any more than Al. When most of us were barely 20 or just in our early 20s, Al was already 35. At the time we probably didn't appreciate the athletic reality of that disparity.
What if a middle-aged Woody Allen had joined your collegiate gymnastics team? That was Al. He was particular. He loved perfect hand cracks. He was neurotic about rattley finger cracks, and could be the first one to be overwhelmed by the proposition of a certain type of climb. But he would still go!
Roberts was tidy, meticulous, and always well prepared. He was big on details and guidebooks. It's no wonder we called him "Voice of the Crags". I believe he was actually semiretired, or so it seemed. Before we met him, the only job which he'd had that I knew about was his sewing stint with Allan Pietresana 's Buttermilk Mountain Works.
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The Voice of the Crags, 3 AM Crack, Super Crack Buttress, spring, 1983:
Roberts on the summit of Primrose Dihedrals, Moses, spring, 1983:
(notice how late it is?)
I've since learned that before he was a climber, he was into golf. (Maybe this comes from Big Al Bartlett. They were close.) And he cut with that crew just as he has with us …
Toss us a bone Al!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Apr 22, 2016 - 03:58pm PT
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This thread needs more Mike Paul!
"Say, where did you boys say you were from? Missouri. Oh ... and what ... Colorado? Check this unit out we just found. It's the Pigpen."
Mike Paul a.k.a. Watusi, Mike Downing, Christian Griffith, early/mid 1980s:
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At the tail end of the Stonemaster era, Mike Paul carried on the sandbag tradition just about better than anyone. This guy had stuff DIALED. Find me someone who was better at thin cracks in SoCal at that time, besides Bachar. Or maybe Rick Piggott at Mount Woodson. I double dare you …
By the late 70s, he had absorbed the Mount Woodson classics into his solo circuit. Hear My Train a Comin', Drivin' South, and Californian Knight among others. These are overhanging finger cracks on oversized boulders. Hardly anyone besides Bachar and Mike Paul would've thought of soloing them at the time.
One cold day in Josh, Mike mentioned this to Largo while a bunch of us were out bouldering. Largo kind of had to shrug it off. Not that John didn't believe Mike, and John was stoked for him, but he definitely had to pause. What could he say?
There was a time in the early 80s when Bachar had Mike Paul in his rearview mirror. For real. Not long after Bachar soloed Hot Rocks, Mike soloed Hot Rocks, with Tucker Tech as witness.
One day shortly after that solo, a bunch of us were blazing on Cid (it wasn't all psychedelics all the time mind you, we smoked a lot of marijuana in between trips), and about five or six of us were standing in a lineup. And I really mean a lineup, like cadets at an inspection.
Bachar walked up to us and looked into our pupils and laughed. The breeze was really blowing our hair back. He gave us the usual scant acknowledgment, saying hello to us, but when he got to Mike Paul he just stood in front of him, grinning. Bachar was just staring at him and he wasn't letting go.
Nothing needed to be said. Bachar was acknowledging that Mike was really becoming a bad ass. Mike can be almost shy at times. He just stood there, feeling he was being put on the spot, while Bachar absorbed Mike's aura. We all saw it. Bachar was really paying homage to the balls out spirit of Mike and the competitive spirit of free soloing. Few could really play that game and get anywhere near Bachar, without dying.
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Watusi, after buying chalk in Mexico, spring of 1983.
On our way to a multi-pitch 5.11+ FA called Wall of Voodoo, across from The Throne, Canyon Tajo:
Mike cruising a rare section of face climbing on Wall of Voodoo:
Mike, bouldering one of Bachar's creations, The Optigrip:
Mike Paul, self-portrait:
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looking sketchy there...
Social climber
Lassitude 33
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Apr 22, 2016 - 04:05pm PT
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Roy, Great shots of Alan. For many years, he lived in a Blue VW Bus, that was (as you mention) meticulously ordered and maintained. We called him the voice of the crags for his particular talent of recalling exact move sequences, gear and other detailed beta for routes. It was uncanny that he not only remembered this, but you could count on it being right. Of course, if you didn't want to know, better not to ask.
For some reason, I can't be sure, but I always got the impression that he was educated as an engineer. We always had fun climbing or shooting the breeze with Alan. After many, many years living the life of a traveling climber (then more stationary at Todd's house) and developing some health issues, he went back to school to train for a career in nursing. He eventually moved to Vegas to finish that up. That was probably the last I saw of him. Too bad, cause he was/is a great guy.
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looking sketchy there...
Social climber
Lassitude 33
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Apr 22, 2016 - 04:10pm PT
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Mike is Mr. Talent. A super talented athlete (climber), then musician and now artist. He would make problems like PigPen look like V0- ("Wow, looks fun and guess it ain't that hard"...hah)
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Apr 22, 2016 - 04:56pm PT
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Mike Waugh a.k.a. The Gran Wazoo, Stony Point, and the San Fernando Valley crew.
Aside from Guy Keesee and Nick Badyrka, we haven't really touched on these guys.
Is Jan McCollum from the Valley? I think so. Definitely Hank Levine, Dan Hershman, Tony Yaniro, and probably Randy Leavitt?
Wazoo is truly very strong. Remember the white deck shoes he would trounce us with on the hard problems?
And SUCH a modest soul (right ... uh-huh).
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How many times has Mike Waugh done the Bachar Yerian? Five I think. Yes:
Bachar Yerian ascent list, courtesy of Clint Cummins.
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Mike, hamming it up at Dead Man Summit, 1984:
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Craig Fry
Trad climber
So Cal.
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Apr 22, 2016 - 04:58pm PT
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Mike Paul, the Watusi
He was one of the top So. Cal. climbers for least a decade
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Apr 22, 2016 - 05:03pm PT
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Great shots of Mike on All Washed Up!
I especially like the black and white.
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Craig Fry
Trad climber
So Cal.
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Apr 22, 2016 - 05:05pm PT
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I hooked up with Dan Hershman a bunch during the 90s up at Mammoth Mt.
We would tele, and his wife would board
It was good times, Bachar, the Fish, Manx, Cole and some other notables would be up there..
I would see them on the bunny slopes as I whizzed by
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overwatch
climber
Arizona
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Apr 22, 2016 - 06:47pm PT
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I think Bridwell was a pretty badass skier at one point Craig why didn't you hook up with him and like, Steve McKinney? They were buds and that McKinney guy was something else way ahead of his time from the stories Jim told me
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Craig Fry
Trad climber
So Cal.
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Apr 22, 2016 - 07:04pm PT
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Bridwell and Steve McKinney were done skiing when I was out there
When I lived in Tahoe 81-84, my girlfriend grew up with the McKinneys.
I met Bridwell a couple times up there but he seemed distracted.
I climbed with other locals, Eric Perlman, Stewie, Joe Hedge
I was big into tele 88-2000,
Now the question is
What the hell happened to the Bird?
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Craig Fry
Trad climber
So Cal.
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Apr 22, 2016 - 07:23pm PT
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Another funny story from BITD
My first time at Suicide Rock (76ish) with my climbing bros, we decide we can for sure do a 5.8, so we go to the North Side and check out the Guillotine
Our fearless leader, Kevin Watts will lead
he gets up to the bottom of the "tine" and gets some good pro in
He launches off onto the lieback from hell, a gapping flake with a slick foot surface,,, he gets up about 10 feet and flings off like a projectile
Luckily the pro holds, so we lower him the ground and BAILLLlllllllllll
10 years later
I walk up to the Guillotine that I still haven't done since that day and launch off for an easy free solo, I get to the "tine" and am reminded of that day long ago, the gapping vertical lieback above me,
but now it feels like a rail from heaven, I fire up it wondering what all the fuss was about back then.
I scramble back to the base and this guy comes up to and says, are you Dr. F?
I ask why, and he says it's me, Kevin Watts, I came up to see my old nemesis, and you are up there free soloing it !! WTF??
he just got out of 8 years in the military and missed it all
not sure happened to him after that
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Apr 22, 2016 - 07:27pm PT
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Now it's coming out, Craig.
How insensitive and just plain demeaning of you ... heh heh.
I mean, really now.
No wonder The Fish rides you so hard!
 That IS quite the coincidence.
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